Thunder
by tjcbunni22
Summary: alternate twlight. When Edward fell for her, he opened up Pandora's box and plunged an almost human girl into a world of monsters, wars and true supernatural love. Twilight, like never before... Sequel. Canon minus Edward and Jacob
1. Footprints of Time

**FOOTPRINTS OF TIME**

**Xx~xx~xX**

**EDWARD CULLEN**

**Xx~xx~xX**

I couldn't say I knew exactly what I was looking for.

All I had to go by was her Grandmother-Pangra's dimming memories of a world of Old, a jungle filled with looming shadows and dangerous secrets. Everything veiled in decades of a mind worn out by keeping such things hidden. A world of Old…

Vampires were of the oldest possibly, but this was all according to our records. Our ego's at being at the top of the food chain.

A world of Old… that's what Pangra had referred to and of course I could not seek her out after I had made the promise to _her_. To her… my one and only, the last person left to reside solely in my conscious-for that was what I had after I had traded my soul for this living damnation. A conscious and only if I willed it. Only if I refuted what I was…

If I could fall under the spell of sleep, I would dream of only her. Danishka. I would dream of her small smile that never revealed any teeth… I would dream of her side-pout that meant so many things… I would dream of her dimples. I would dream of her dainty fingers and her tiny wrists…

If I could dream and I dreamt of her, then when I had nightmares it would be of my demented betrayal to my unbeating heart. Her wide unbelieving stare as I ripped apart everything we had both worked towards; her-a friend and myself-being in her life; a hidden happiness that had eluded me for decades. A taste of heaven… if I was a demon and there was no doubt that I wasn't; if I were a demon and I had been walking through hell-she had to be heaven. She had to be my heaven, a little piece of it sent to me by God as a sign of sympathy for my unending journey through this accursed living death...

How do I hurt? I hurt with the bitter despair of a thousand condemned souls… awake in our hell, alive in our death. Forced to watch as the world moves unconcerned at our loss. I would rot in this seedy motel in Rio if I were more cowardly… I would grow mould and have cobwebs around me as I waited for her years to pass and age to take over her. I would wait… as time passed.

Could I wait?

No, I had to wait. All the little fleeting thoughts of disobeying my own command had to be punished. I would not backtrack and risk losing her more thoroughly… all I could do was remain true to the one promise I had made to her. That I we would find a cure for her thirst, for her abrupt supernatural tendencies that left her human body drained-we would find out about her past.

And although Carlisle and I had not managed to analyse her blood, although we had fallen to theories and were forced to settle to hypothesised conclusions-I had to go on for her. I would figure it out…

"When will you be home sweetie" Esme asked softly. I was grateful for the millions of miles apart us… not having to _hear_ from her thoughts how sad I had made her. My mother and best friend…

"I will come…" I began but I stopped. I could not lie to her. Would I come home… ever? What would I do once I had finished with my task in South America…?

"It's okay… just keep a phone with you and do what you have to do. I know how truly important she was to you. How _irrevocably _lodged in your heart she is…"

"I can't…talk…" I gasped, falling to my knees in an incomprehensible agony, a bitter pain that struck at the hollow cavity in my chest at any mention of her… any sign of her. And by the heavens, _she was everywhere._ Every single blue was a small fleck lodged in her varying multi-coloured iris of blue till purple and back.

Every brown fell under judgment of her silky cocoa skin. Every black lost it's richness in comparison to her wild mane. Everything was her and yet it could never measure up... it could never satisfy me and turned wickedly into a form of torture, into sadistic nuances of Danishka.

"Edward, _come home"_ Esme begged, all pretences thrown aside. "Let me take care of you!"

"I have to go mother" I said and I cut the line.

Xx~xx~xX

I needed to be away from the city, I realised. I needed to brave solitude and stop falling to the safety of bustling sounds and intermingling thoughts; I needed to be alone. I needed to be far away. The World of Old could not be reached in _Cities_ but to get where I wanted to be, I had to be crafty-there was no point searching in the dark when any number of humans could hold the necessary information and be used as a useful tool. What I knew was simple; I was in the wrong part of South America and for me to get where I needed to be, I had to do that inconspicuously, I couldn't afford having villagers worked up on my account. Elusive… but with a steady human contact.

"Sir…" the man insisted, reaching his hand out for me and following me through the thick crowd. "I have what you _need_, sir…"

"No, you don't…" I breathed stopping suddenly and allowing him to reach me. He sighed in relief, breathing heavy from the little exertion his sturdy form had to put up to keep me in his sights and I could see from his mind-I could see what he had that he prayed every man needed.

But I had no use of drugs or sex.

I had use for him however, I had use for his vermin like mind that seemed to have a knack for survival and knowing things of value-a mind that could tell I was dangerous but put it down to money. Money made people dangerous in this world…

"You sure, senor?" he chuckled uneasily, noting that this American somehow managed to remain pale in this heat, not a single sweat drop on my marble face. Noting that I was too good looking and a man of such attractiveness may want another kind of thing, may need something more…

"I need… you to tell me where your grandmother lives?" I sighed impatiently and he frowned.

"What kind of sicko are you…" he breathed, taking a step back and shaking his head. "I got two grandmothers, amigo... and I love them too dearly…"  
"The grandmother who does your coke for you" I clarified. "If you could arrange for a meeting, that would be most appreciated"  
"My grandmother…!" he said in fake indignation but the moment I took out the wad of bills in my pocket, his expression smoothed over. "My grandmother, amigo… she is old, man. She is ancient… maybe my sister?"

"I don't want to do _that_" I hissed, trying to keep my patience. Jasper had always been better at shady dealings with criminals-even human ones. I had no patience for vileness, it called out to the short tempered monster in me and this man had me retracting my initial thought for a human contact to find out on the world of Old. "And her being ancient is exactly why I have use for you and your _wretchedness_…"

"What you want to do, man" he asked, staring at the money in my hand. "Come, friend… we talk over there…"  
I let him lead us to an ally, my mind whirling with violence for him-contemplating killing him and ridding Rio of is vileness when he had served his purpose. In South America, the aged were more wary of pale beautiful strangers-more suspicious and rightly so. It would be easier to have a willing person to talk to, to ask questions and have source out information from superstitious villagers for me…

He was thinking of stabbing me and running of with my money.

"What you laughing at amigo?" he asked, reaching behind him for his knife-which I had already taken from him.

"You" I sighed in a detached tone raising his knife in the dull street light and watching as his eyes widened in horror, his hand still searching for the blade he had tucked under his belt. "I have no time for this"

I snapped the blade easily in half with my two fingers and flung the shards in the dark ally.

"Your grandmother, I would like to ask her questions on Peru" I said coolly.

"Sure man…" he stammered, finally allowing his drunken mind to grab onto the fact he maybe in danger. "You going to give me the cash though…"  
"I'll think on it" I whispered. "Lead the way…"

Xx~xx~xX

After being a monster for so long and forgetting most of what it was like to be human, one would think a vampire would be used to uneasiness and timid acknowledgments. Carlisle had corrupted me in this sense; to _not _want to be a monster. I suppose even if I had been turned by another, my frail humanity would have fought its way up regardless.

But it really was Danishka who had spoilt me into forgetting momentarily that I was a vampire. That I was a fiend of the highest quality. She should never have gazed up at me with such effortless trust that I began to believe I would never be false, she should never have been so eager to let me know I was good so I walked around thinking I could make a difference to something…. She should have never let me believe I had a soul… even if it was for that one second when I had made her smile, when I had made her blush-when she had made a cold form warm up from the inside out.

He leads me through alleyways, turning back to see if I am able to keep up. I am frustrated already; I know where it is we are heading naturally from his mind and these feeble pretences in a community were myths rule their minds through9 night and day is wearing on me. His every thought on 'screwing me over' annoying me exponentially and my already shaky hold on my now disrupted humanity is allowing the vampire inside me to growl for his blood. But I wouldn't taint my self with the likes of such…

I haven't hunted, I realise.

"Come on man" he repeats in English although I am right behind him-it's a habit he has, this is something he does often; lead strange men to his sisters and then mutters in Portuguese how easily I move over the dilapidated streets as though I have the route mapped out; not bothering with squinting or falling in the dim to nonexistent light.

He ducks through an opening on the side of a crumbling building, scrambling inside and the awaiting my 'panicked call' because he is sure I haven't seen his _dexterous_ move through the little entrance. I move swiftly inside, halting my breathing when the smell of urine hits my nose torturously and appear beside him quietly.

"What are you waiting for?" I whisper and he jumps, swearing low and shaking his head.

"You quick man" he mutters. "Have you been here before?"  
"Go and tell your grandmother there is a man who wants to ask her a few questions on the village she is from" I instruct.

"How do you know what village she is from" he frowns.

I picked it up from your thoughts a few days ago, I want to say. I want to tell him that he had not found me but I had lured him to seek me out with precisely placed actions. I want to mention that I had heard the fight he had with his grandmother on how she wants to return to her little hut and leave this sinful life behind and spend the rest of her few days atoning for her greed to the money they have received.

"I read it here" I murmur instead, waving the money in his face and he grumbles, suspicious but more greedy than anything.

"Come, you wait out the door…" he mutters petulantly, his unease increasing at his latent instincts awareness that he is alone with a dangerous predator in darkness. "I'll talk to her"

"And this is why" I muse to myself softly, when he disappears through a rickety door casting me one last apprehensive look before heading to pull his grandmother away from sifting cocaine "Money will always be at the top of the predatory list"

Xx~xx~xX

She sits tense in the chair, her back straight and pressed against the chair and eyes bulging out-staring directly at me accusingly and I am glad the light in the room is dimmed and casts everything in orange hues… including me. It would be most counterproductive if she were to note that I was truly as pale as death right about now…

"Good Evening" I murmur in Portuguese and she nods tersely. She thinks I am a spy for the police.

She is thin, her olive skin creased and parched with hard days and worse evenings and hair billowing weakly over her head in white wisps. Her grandson gives her grief, she thinks. She may have led him to this life-and this is part of the reason she is finding it hard to rectify the situation-but he refuses to have a conscious. Desperate times had called for desperate measures…

"I would like to speak to her alone" I say loudly, in English and Pedro jumps from behind the door, his thoughts flurrying over how I 'know things' and a slight after thought that his grandmother maybe in danger. He may have put her in real danger…

"Move from the door" I say irritated. "I will know if you are listening… and if it makes you comfortable to get back up go ahead Pedro…"

He moves after a beat and heads into the dark streets of the grungy shack-village he calls home to call a few friends to deal with me. I may be the police for all he knows. I may be a spoilt rich man with a father looking for me and if he kidnaps me; his family will be set for life…

"Margaret…" I breathe and she stiffens. "Please, only a few questions and two strange requests. It is something we are both searching for, my dear"

She peers at me, curious milky grey eyes noting that my Portuguese is flawless-along with my skin and charm and she loosens up a little, but never dispelling that I may be a cop. That I may be a rival producer out to find out how far their intricate system goes.

"I have no interest for anything but… where _you_ are from and I think we can help each other" I sigh and then groan internally when I realise I am out of breath and will need to take in the bitter coke air of this little room if I am to talk.

"I am from a place you do not know of, young man" she murmurs scowling. "And why such a hidden inconsequential place should interest you is beside me…. it arouses my suspicion, beautiful stranger. You seek coke-mothers out, crawl through this filth into the dark pits of no man's land for tales on a _stupid_ village…"

"A village you wish to return to" I murmur, grimacing as my nose stings exponentially, feeling the urge to sniff the air away-my senses begging me to leave the little badly ventilated room immediately.

"I do not wish to return" she scoffs. "That's why I ran away with my children"

"I don't think you ran away to be sifting cocaine till you were old and in need of a walking stick?"  
"What do you want" she growls.

"I want to take you back to the village" I say slowly. "And I will be your elusive guest… and I will give you instruction on finding out a few things for me"  
"Why can't you just do this alone" she hissed.

"A white man is seen as a threat by many in your village, no?" I ask softly. Now what more of a pale beautiful ghosting man…

"True" she nods her head stiffly and then snorts a little-her eyes never relenting on their paranoid scrutiny of my still form. "What will you do for me, white man?"  
"I'll give your granddaughter freedom from a tyrant brother…" I breathe and I immediately realise that to give them both a more permanent freedom it will have to be in the death of Pedro.

"That mean money?" she asks in English scowling, thinking of how if they are away from Pedro's ruthlessness she can send her granddaughter to school

"I will pay for her school personally" I say steely-her eyes widen at the accuracy of her request. "Do you agree to this?"

"I… I agree" she whispers, hope shining in her eyes. "Please, soon then… not another day of this!"  
Xx~xx~xX

It feels better when I am moving through this, when I still have purpose. The pain seems to intermingle with the notion that I would have brought her some form of peace. That I would have repented for ever stepping into her life and disrupting things if I clear this one mystery for her. She would never have to worry, she should never be allowed to sit and worry-worry of who she is.

I was never the most adept tracker but if I threw myself into this and used what I had-this very evil nature to benefit the good of my cause, I would surely succeed.

"Are you sure Pedro will not find us?" she asked again-timidly and then cast an anxious gaze over her shoulder expecting to see Pedro following. Expecting to see Pedro's short form bobbing over the many heads at the park-station, his oily face littered with various scars from various beatings and his thin dark hair whipping pathetically in the breeze as he sought to bring Margaret and Juanita back to were they wrongly belonged.

"You and your daughter I safe" I sighed, ignoring the ache in my throat and placing the shades over my head and bringing the large hat out of my bag. "I took care of it… Pedro will remain in Rio"

"Hmm" Margaret murmured, pausing with me as a car drove by us, her arms wound around her "You took care of it, huh?"  
"I took care of it" I repeated, enjoying her ever pessimistic thoughts, more especially the way she didn't care whether or not my taking care of things would result in her grandson dead somewhere.

"_He_ will pay for my school?" Juanita asked in Portuguese, eyeing me surreptitiously, her thoughts a tangle of blushing, hormones and wariness at this pale stranger who had rescued her grandmother and her.

"He understands you" Margaret replied smiling a little. "Yes… he had better"

"Or else…?" I challenged, smiling a little besides myself.

"You will see how crazy this old woman is" she hissed allowing me to lead her to the yellow car I had hired to take us half way through our journey; it was parked in the shade of a building like I had instructed the driver. The shade and shadows had been my ally all through the journey. The rest of the way required hiking and I wasn't sure how I was going to get around to acting human with that. I wasn't good at moving human slow for long periods of time…

But with Danishka I had wanted time to stand completely still and lock us in its sights forever.

"White Man?" the woman murmured and I saw through her mind how my face had twisted into an uncomfortable grimace-a slightly scary grimace that made Juanita hide behind her grandmother in confusion; her silly thoughts from a minute ago on how handsome I had been and how she hoped I would notice her flying out the window and replace with unease at having to travel alone with me for possibly three days.

"Call me Anthony" I breathed. "You can get into the car…"  
They cast me one last confused look before allowing the driver to take their bags and load them in the boot of the car. I realised now that having the driver with us for hours would be putting a notch on my human interaction tally and I didn't want that. I didn't want too many humans remembering my face; it was okay for Margaret and her daughter who will be forever lost in their quite safe world after this…

"I'll drive" I said coolly when the thin wiry man came to me expectantly.

He raised an eyebrow, revealing a yellow smile before shoving his hands in his pockets.

"What's that?" he said smiling again.

"I am taking your car" I said slow and deliberate and his eyes widened at the inhuman chill that ran down his spine. "Of course I will compensate you…"  
I reached in my pocket and gave him three hundred American dollars for his banged up yellow car. He stared at the money in his hands in disbelief and looked at my face with narrowed eyes, trying to see into the shade I stood in, trying to get a visual of my face hidden behind the sunglasses and under the large cap. He was considering making a noise about this, cussing me out as a pompous American but then I took a step towards him and removed the shades, staring into his eyes and seeing the reflection of my dark tortured soulless eyes.

"Leave" I growled and he spluttered, jumping back and shuffling through the crowd too quickly-deciding three hundred was all he would get for his car and possibly his life. It was a good deal in the end…

"Anthony?" Margaret murmured from the back seat, staring at my looming form beside the car. "How you going to drive…"  
"I know the way" I cut her, moving to the drivers seat fluidly-a little too fast. "No harm will come to you under my care, I promised I would return you to your village and that's what's going to happen"

"Who are you" Margaret asked in a lost dialect of Portuguese, her thoughts twining around the options of 'who' and 'what' with regards to me.

"A harmless traveller to you, Margaret" I whispered, looking at her worried ancient face through the rear view mirror. "Nothing but a harmless traveller through time"

Xx~xx~xX

The thick tall trees of the South American jungle knit over each square metre and fill the air in cool freshness and provide the necessary cover for me to move through the day. It's beautiful, it's breathtaking in its untouched quality and rawness but that very beauty is were the danger lies in.

As it is with all things...

"Are you sure..." Margaret asks again and I smile at her. The bags are not heavy but the anticipation is... for both of us.

How reckless it is for me to travel with a human, how utterly unequivocally callous to my own anonymity as a vampire it is-but it has given me a new insight on what it means to be an atoning predator. I have not fed in a _while_-Pedro's blood would have been the most tainting thing to my body in this moment; I could not move side-by-side with two traumatised women with eyes swimming with the blood of their relative and glowing like a demon.

We have been travelling for two days with regular necessary stops due to Margaret's health. She would rather remain quiet and go through the aches and pains to reach the place she was born quickly-but hearing her thoughts helps me a lot. It had bothered them to a diminutive measure how quiet I was and how easily I kept up the steady pace while carrying a load that would have rendered any normal man breathless within five metres of movement. They think I am eager for this but they don't understand that the human pace we are moving is a test to my patience.

I feel like scooping them both up in my arms and simply zooming the rest of the way...

But trust is important if I want to see this through.

And talking brings trust...

"You are yet to tell me the reason you are interested Peru" Margaret murmurs, taking a swig of water from the flask and passing it to me. I drink carefully; prolonging the moment I remove the water from my lips and prepare myself for a 'refreshed' expression.

"It is personal" I sigh, wiping the warmish liquid of my chin-a little clumsiness can help a great deal in appearing human.

The few drops of water churn in my stomach and with it, my throat groans and the monster whines.

"It better..." she begins her eyes flashing, handing the flask over to Juanita absently.

"It's not drugs or sex" I say dryly and she nods-she believes me and that gives me a little satisfaction. "Maybe a ten minute rest?"

"Make it five..." she says stonily, dropping her back at the base of a tree and reaching in her pocket for an ointment she uses to ward of the many insects. "And you can tell me why it is you are trekking in the jungle..."  
"I can tell you some of the story" I murmur "Because in all honesty, I am hoping the jungle with shed light to why I am here"  
"Cryptic" she laughs, her eyes crinkling in many lines at the corners. "But I am interested"

"I am looking for something" I say, shaking my head when she offers the little tin with the foul smelling ointment.

"Something like what?" Juanita asks, rubbing the green jelly like substance on her arms and legs.

"I don't know" I breathe, shifting into the shade of the tree "Maybe a rare flower, a magical fountain..."  
"You aren't joking?" Margaret asks "You are really looking for something... that you don't know"  
"Yes" I sigh.

"Is it like..."Juanita says thoughtfully, her mind whirling with little fantasies "A magic potion to heal a lover"  
I chuckle and she blushes lightly.

"Maybe..." I listen carefully to the sound of the wild-Margaret had been worried about the animals that resided in here but they knew there was greater predator in their midst. "Maybe that is exactly what it is"

Xx~xx~xX

I have travelled long enough to have a different type of awe to each scenery; a different type of appreciation to nature because I have seen it all twice over. The jungle in South America is _vast; _it spreads out through to so much land that one simply can't go _exploring _on a whim-this is a world that a conscious decision to get lost in the emerald giant foliage could only permit one to discover unknown realms.

"Almost there..." Margaret smiles "This is the middle of nowhere. I don't know how you are getting back... no cell phone reception, no other travellers... and definitely no Margaret"

"I have a good memory" I murmur.

"Would have to be iron, this memory of yours" she sighs wearily, her pace has slowed-I am surprised by her stamina with her age.

"Like stone engravings" I whisper, closing my eyes and seeing her blue ones staring up at me with undeserved trust.

"Stop!" I say quickly, tensing and dropping the backs. They pause, staring at my face in confusion but I can hear the thoughts, the angry cautious thoughts of another predator... one that had been following our scent or more precisely _my scent_...

"There are two..." I murmur, glancing at Margaret. If I allowed them to walk ahead, to move quickly and I remained here were the two vampires would come across me... maybe that would save them. I could apologise; blood drinkers were most ruthless with their territories. I would have to apologise and leave... through the water possibly...

But the vampires are quick and soon, they appear. I have no time to warn them, I have no time to apologise for the peril I have put them in...

Xx~xx~xX

"This is or territory" the woman murmurs, stalking me and paying no attention to Juanita and her grandmother. There is no need to worry about the two humans, she thinks I intend on feeding from them... they are just a meal... she would gladly allow me the humans if I were to leave their home immediately.

"I mean no harm" I announce, raising my hands palms up and backing away, trying not to stare at the male. He is undoubtedly human and yet... he mirrors her moves, he stands close to her and watches me with the sharpness of a vampire.

"Leave" he growls.

"You can take the women..." she says again, her red eyes flashing over Margaret's face-Margaret gasps, her thoughts a series of panicked flashes. She is in the midst of demons, she realises. I am a demon, she realises. She let a demon lure her away from the city, she cries internally. She had bargained her soul, she had bargained her grandchild... she was wading in sin...

"I was simply escorting them to their village" I state and the male snorts-it is a fluid sounds but it lacks the soft lustre vampires coat every abrupt human-like reaction in.

"We care not for your lies" she sighs "I see you are hungry, I willingly allow you the two... but leave"  
"I am telling you the truth" I say seriously "I am escorting them to their village... it is only six hours away at human pace"  
"We do not allow vampires in our territory" the male states "We live here in anonymity and cannot have any influx in deaths from the surrounding villages"

"I seek you no harm!" I stress. "I am searching for something... only. I won't hunt here..."  
I would have told them I only feed on animals but with my eyes as black as death they would not believe me so readily and with the added anomaly of escorting humans through a dark and dangerous forest...

"What are you searching for?" the vampire woman asked.

"I... don't really know..." I breathed, looking at Margaret. She was shaking, quivering-Juanita holding her in her arms. "No harm will come to them?"  
"You are the only one here who has motive to harm them" the woman states, watching me charily with her body facing the boy in a protective stance. "What do you search for"  
"I don't know" I said again and she snarled "I _really_ don't know"  
"Where did this curiosity for this _something _start?" the male asked and if I had thought it was some sort of trickery-I was corrected. His heart was real and so was his ethereal beauty.

"My name is Edward Cullen" I stated closing my eyes and exhaling sharply "I come from a large coven..."

They panicked at that, hissing lightly; thinking I was trying to ambush them.

"No, I assure you I mean you no harm...?" I trailed off, giving them room to be familiar with me.

"I am Huilen" the woman said coolly "This is my nephew, Nahuel"  
"Nahuel" I breathed unable to hide my fascination with him. "You are a vampire?"  
"It matters not" he growled frowning beautifully "Where does this tale of enigmatic _something's _begin?"

"With a girl..." I said slowly. "A girl with blue eyes and skin the colour of cocoa..."

Xx~xx~xX

"Nahuel and I have never formally met any other vampires..." Huilen said indifferently-a lie, she knew of one vampire and others like Nahuel. She thought on other things absently, the contents of the thought lost till it re-emerged later on.

Huilen carried Margaret and Juanita's bags easily and leading the way- slightly irked at moving so slow. She was small, her arms thin and her skin much fairer than Nahuel's but the resemblance was there in the shape of their nose and hairline.

They were not bothered by the terrified humans as I was. I wanted to console Margaret on the loss of the young man she had thought she was becoming acquainted to on a personal level. No repeating of paying for college and helping Juanita calmed them; they were certain we were leading them to hell...

"Human's are not to know of our existence" Nahuel said softly-to low for the human women to hear.

"They don't know what we are" I say and then add "Or what _you _are"

"Do you not know of the villages in this area" Huilen snaps "They believe easily, they see and know the shadows of the trees and animals... discretion and distance is of the highest concurrence?"

"I promised I would reach them to the village" I whisper "I want it to be a promise I can keep... and I will _ensure_ it is kept"

"We seek no quarrel" Huilen sighs "The faster we leave these humans, the faster you leave our home..."

"Understood" I murmur, glancing at Nahuel.

Xx~xx~xX

The village is small.

The huts and shacks are the epitome of organic, the air filled with nature and pollen. They almost run through the woods, leaving their bags in the shrubbery in their fear. We watch them silently for a moment, we hear their screams and insistent murmurs of demons and I realise this would only be another tale to the long list of supernatural stories the villages contain.

How many times had they been touched by supernatural beings and left alive and with a stronger fear of the devil and more veneration for heaven?

Xx~xx~xX

"I was convinced she is human" I tell Huilen but it is Nahuel I watch.

His lips twitch slightly; he thinks on this other vampire-his father-and prays Danishka is not a lost sister of his. She can't be, he wars with himself. If what I say is true... she can't be... she is too far away, he thinks. She is too human...

"Is there more to this?" he asks. "How did you come upon the girl?"  
"She came upon me" I whisper "My family..."  
"I have never heard of such living from vampires" Nahuel says sceptically and Huilen nods in agreement.

"You have met but one vampire..."  
they stop their walking, hissing low and glaring at me.

"I spoke of her oddness..." I say slowly "Talents? I have a talent..."

"What talent... do you steal memories and secrets" Huilen accuses and I frown at the crude manner she has managed to paint my telepathy.

"I hear thoughts" I say dryly. They stare at me charily then, their lips set in an unforgiving line. "I am unable to 'turn it of' unfortunately"  
"Hmm" Nahuel murmurs, resuming our too fast walking through the dark woods "My one sister has a talent"  
"What kind of talent?" I ask him slowly-Huilen watches me, she doesn't trust me and fears Nahuel's blindness when it comes to his sisters. She fears that this father of Nahuel-Joham-has made another and Nahuel will-like all the other times-seek to save the poor girl from Joham's clutches...

"Persuasion" Nahuel states dryly, frowning "I have not seen her in a _while._ We had a falling out due to her gift and how willingly she allows J.. My father to utilise it"  
"I understand" I tell him and he looks at me from the corner of my eye and smiles a little.

"The girl... is her mother alive?" he asks.

"No" I say and he frowns again "The relevance...?"  
"None of my sisters nor myself have mothers" he says softly "Human's... cannot survive immortal children"  
"Immortal children and what you are, are two different things" I tell him-he retained the memory of his gory birth with titanium recall and equal unspoilt guilt "A half-vampire..."

If I were not in a form of emotional coma, if I could not stop thinking of azure and soft laughs-this would have returned to Carlisle immediately. The world retained so many hidden nooks for the impossible to happen... such impossibilities would grow and weave themselves through to so many lives and change what we perceived as ordinary... and even the extraordinary would go under reformation then...

Half-Vampire...

"You are a walking impossibility" I murmur and he frowns.

"I should not exist!" he growls "This, what Joham does, is abomination and the highest form of cruelty and I pray that this girl is not part of it!"

"I pray that Joham has..." I pause, stopping in the middle of the undergrowth... my form going rigid and the memory-her memory and her nightmare flashing over my eyes.

"The man with red eyes..." I whisper-feeling a mental coldness snaking around my mind, taking in Nahuel's own memory of this _father_ of his "It's him..."  
"What is it?" Huilen asks from up ahead. She had deliberately kept her pace faster to allow Nahuel to spin out his story gently and ask his questions.

"She has seen him!" I yell and he watches me guardedly. "Oh, heavens no...!"  
"No, if she had met him..." he says softly, trying to calm me "She would be his... a half-vampire that is more human? He would not let her go so easily..."

"Her grandmother moved her from country to continent..." I say fast, fisting my hair-my eyes moving over everything fast and throat constricting-I needed to feed but the fear and anxiousness was overwhelming...

"She kept her away from anything supernatural, she discouraged any odd behaviour... she deliberately moved them to the sunniest places on earth and it was her idiot stepfather who made Cindy take her away from all of that safety and bring her to fucking cloudy Forks!" I roar, all the little pieces clicking into place.

"She has a human relative?" Nahuel asks slightly in awe of the fact "A grandmother...?"  
"Yes" I answer his thoughts, giving up my telepathic etiquette to allow him to voice them out "She grew human fast. She is human, as I have said-in all regards save for the thirst and supernatural episodes"

"Talia" Huilen states and I stare at her-Nahuel sighing despondently and moving away from me.

I see the woman in Huilen's mind-I see the blue eyes like lightning, I see the small nose and all knowing smile... I see the woman, this _Talia_ and there is no doubt that the woman is the link to Danishka...

"She died" Nahuel states. "She was... my sister. The only one I stayed in contact with, she died more than a decade..."  
"How did she die?" I say quickly.

"He killed her" Nahuel murmurs almost too softly for my ears to pick up. "My... father. She ran from him, she... it was before Flora's gift was fully developed to _persuade _Talia to do Joham's bidding..."

"She ran after meeting Nahuel and I" Huilen said detached "She wanted what we have; a family. She ran and hid but Joham is more than a skilled tracker... he found her with a human and pregnant"

"What of the child?" I ask softly and they both look at my face.

"Died with the mother" Huilen says. "It was too human for Joham... of no use... he told Nahuel this"

"You are certain"  
"No" Nahuel says before Huilen can voice her yes out. "I will tell you this, stranger; the village was half-empty, Talia had warned them and she had prepared... the man I know did not survive Joham's wrath but the child... I know not of the fate"  
"She gave it to someone she trust" I thought, falling back to my perfect image of Danishka and the half-vampire Talia. "She is the mother, there is no doubt..."

"The grandmother's name?" Huilen asked.

"Pangra" I tell her.

"Pangra..." Nahuel says softly "Talia told me how she may not have found an Aunt like I had, but she had a sister left to her and she had a niece. I don't know how the name Pangra fits to that"

Pangra... Pangra was Danishka's aunt. Of course... but she was Cindy's real maternal grandmother, Pangra had a daughter and that daughter had been Cindy's mother; she lied to Hector that Cindy's mother had hid Danishka from him so he would take Danishka in... So she could ensure Danishka would be better protected in a normal anonymous life...

I had no care for Joham and his sinister exploits; how could I when mosaic of emotions where fleeting through me. I didn't know what this meant, I didn't know how to handle it but the feeling of solving it weighed down the guilt I felt in hurting her.

But did this mean I would have to return to her...?

Was this reason enough when she was safe in her anonymity to the vampire world...? I wanted her safe, and I knew now I had taken the right steps to achieving that but _knowing_ and _wanting_ this to be the right thing, were two different things.

"It seems..." I whispered looking through the forest to the North "I have found the answer to my question and I must... return to my family"  
"Yes" Nahuel breathed, before looking at me intensely-his dark eyes severe and set "But if you would understand to do one thing for us; Joham is a very dangerous being... and if this Pangra knew enough to be anonymous then she has saved the girl. We seek the same fate..."  
"I would not speak you" I said.

"We keep Joham in the past" Huilen murmured as they moved back into the shadows, understanding that our counsel had ended "And would not interfere on any future that involves him; especially with his _creations._ So understand us when we say we want nothing to do with her..."  
He agreed silently and unwillingly with his aunt's decision to keep him away from his beloved sister's child. His aunt held him in her steel arms and understood the importance of remaining as they were... without spreading beyond their territory.

"Goodbye, then" I murmured, making my way away from the jungle filled with secrets.

Xx~xx~xX

How lustrous the way of the immortally damned might seem to simple men. Beauty unparalleled, speed and strength too vast to be challenged and years upon years of conscious imitation of living to be had... how seductive such a thing might be to any being with a heart beat. A being tinkering on the edge of life with each second of existence-mortals would think that having no fear of death something of the highest gift.

I did not fear death because death had no interest in harming me. I feared living, for some time... and then I realised I wasn't alive for life to be too concerned with me either. So I feared existing. I feared it painfully and it took me over... I wandered aimlessly searching for the meaning to this form Carlisle had turned my once fragile body into. No meaning, just... purgatory and desolate complacence.

Such wallowing sadness had been intensified when our duo turned to a trio but then, unwittingly-I adjusted. Existing side by side with two who were meant for each other. Maybe my purpose had been to bear witness to such a wonderful love between Esme and Carlisle. Jealously left me-not for Esme but for Carlisle's permanent happiness-and I accepted and conformed to their happiness.

The intensity of loneliness can only be increased in the presence of company. There they were, all of them... Rosalie with her Emmett, Alice and her Jasper and my parents-and I sat singular and eternal watching how they would never be alone in purgatory. They had been broken free from purgatory by finding each other. Purgatory was for the singularly existing... not for the dually in love.

The one thing that would surely kill a vampire-let's put aside the Volturi and their quick flames-the one thing that would bring a vampire to their knees, have them weep dryly and claw at their own hard flesh... was loneliness. Isolation and detachment from all things because all things were from the natural realm... how do you touch the natural without tainting it with these hard supernatural fingers?

And you would die mentally from this loneliness... and no one would weep because they would not know you were dead. Remember, Death has forsaken you... your only escape from existence would be to challenge it and close yourself from it.

To remain still as time moved by you.

Never to breathe or walk the earth again.

Lost in an ancient forest.

A statue in some cave.

Forever.

Xx~xx~xX

**EDWARD CULLEN**

From all that I had learnt from my journey into only the outskirts of a deadly secretive Jungle, the truth had never been more apparent. I had to stay away from Danishka. I had to leave her small world that she and her sister had created in Forks. I had done the right thing in leaving her, I had done something true and good in letting her be in her beautiful enigmatic form.

Then what of me?

I should never have touched her conscious with the evidence of my presence in this world, I should never have sought her out and I should never have tilted my perfectly crafted sanity in this maddening loneliness with the idea that she was my saviour from existential isolation. And I didn't want to think it... it was such a cruel thing to allow to set root in my immense eternally awake mind for it would only grab hold and continue to grow...

Such a hopelessly cowardly thought to give way to and it hurt me so terribly, as the thought left my mind and travelled past the hollow darkness inside me-somewhere where my soul had resided in I imagined.

Had I not found some sort of balance inside me in this quiet purgatory? I had touched her with my presence, she had reached out and I had gladly taken her hand and led her to my secret place and she had comforted all those fears. Now, after meeting with the half-vampire Nahuel and learning of what she was and what danger I would put her in... She had turned so suddenly from 'Saviour of Edward' to 'Cruel Mistress'.

She had seduced me out of my cocoon of acceptance of isolation, I had tasted her sweet companionship and now, it was away from me and never to be tasted again.

Danishka, so innocent and unaware to this evil that you and I had performed in our equal loneliness; you have set about the steps to my madness. You have tilted that crafted sanity in this loneliness, and I would soon succumb to it...

You have made me realise that no family could shield me from that because what you gave me no other can ever attempt to measure out to in gift. I was alone. I was existing...

And it was only a matter of time before I found my little cave and died in my never decomposing body.

Xx~xx~xX

"Edward, please...!" Esme begged and I allowed my face to break into a pained grimace. Her sobs echoing in my mind even after she had stopped her crying, her pleas falling on me like blows but I had enough memory compassion after what intensity I had felt for Danishka to not indulge her and remain away from them; I knew I wouldn't stay long even if I attempted it and I knew they would not know how to handle this misery.

It would be a form of sadism on my part if I put them through that.

"No" I said after she was done crying, pleading and bribing me. "I won't come... and soon, I suspect-you will not be able to contact me, Mother"  
"No" she said stubbornly and I chuckled morosely. She was very deceiving, my little mother; those doe like-eyes that had once made Carlisle feel so ashamed for having a... little male problem in quiet times, oddly enough mostly times when he was in the shower obsessing over his angel faced newborn. An innocence about her, a sort of vulnerability she exuded and she would spin it on its head by turning into a master craftsmen of guilt inducing love and dangerous mollycoddling. Not many could resist, and even now... a part of me contemplating treating her in her battle tactics.

"Yes" I whispered and she returned to her other weapon-crying and pleading that I allow her to care for me. I had no doubt she would be able to but not for long. Not this time...

"Edward, do not do this..." this was Carlisle, his voice holding that telltale scratchiness that was lost to human ears "Please"  
"Are you with Alice?" I asked and he sighed. "No" he said after a beat.

"Alice, she left" he said, pausing again and then taking in a deep breath "She left without Jasper. You have hurt her, Edward"

"I know" I murmured. "If it's any consolation to the pain I have caused her, as terrible as I imagine-the pain I have caused Danishka may be greater but she will forget it with time. And to those two pains I have managed to manifest in them-the consolation lies here, Carlisle"  
"Edward..." he said-dragging my name in warning and I sighed, finishing my poor apology.

"The consolation here, Father..."I said controlled "...would be that I have destructed myself"  
"Edward..."  
"I should have stayed away in the end" I laughed cynically and then scowled at the sight of the setting sun dipping below some building opposite the mangy hotel I was in. Some inconceivable little town in one of the sunny states. "The pain I feel will encompass tenfold any pain anyone is holding due to my... stupidity and unfortunate blunder. I will pay dearly, I am paying dearly... and I will be paying for eternity"

"No one is looking for you to feel pain!" he gasped. "We love you..."

"You don't know what I feel, Carlisle" I murmured

"Then tell me!" he said impassioned and I imagined him pacing at the other end, wound up and blurring back and forth "Come to me, son... and tell me in person!"

"I don't know... how to ...continue" I said slowly and felt the stinging in my eyes, that crushing sensation the chest goes through in times of such sadness but no tears fell.

"Where did you go?" he asked, his voice shaking in a melodious vibration "Tell me about it, this thing that has made everything turn into darkness for you"

"I went to find out about her" I said numbly "And I found out. And now I know. And it all it means is that I really did do the right thing; I really can't be with her... even as we were. I am a danger to her, not because I would harm her but because I would bring harm to her"  
"Edward... son, I know you are heartbroken" he whispered.

"I have no heart to break" I said harshly. "I have a mind and emotions so resilient and permanent that this will never ever end. I will forever be in this pain. There is no cure to this poison. I am doomed"  
"Edward..." he said my name like it was a rare flower, like it was already withering and dying; conviction lost because he knew me better than any other vampire. I seldom strayed from a choice made. I seldom took into consideration anyone else's opinion of such a choice.

This was done.

I was saying goodbye now.

"You are wasting this goodbye, Carlisle" I said and he groaned. "Goodbye, Father"  
"No" he cried. I cut the line, stared at the phone once, already vowing to never by the technology again and crushed it into grey plastic bits, the green memory chip spewing over like guts.

"Goodbye" I looked out at the orange sky, maybe if I jumped high enough I would meet the flames of the sun in a fiery embrace and return to the earth as floating ashes.

Such idle thoughts. This was not going to be easy and once, long ago-a human lifetime had seemed as little as the seconds in a minute. But I knew, I would never be able to find my hidden cave to die from time until she had reached the limits of mortality...

And the seconds ticked hard and painful in my mind. Seconds upon minutes, giving way to hours...

**_Disclaimer:_I don't own anything except original characters.**

**_Authors note:_this may be confusing if you have not read 'When Lightning Strikes', which has since been renamed 'Lightning'. If you haven't read it, fear not; this first lengthy chapter strives to help keep you updated somewhat as it is a series of Edward P.O.V last chapters to introduce part two; 'Thunder'.**


	2. Children of God

**CHILDREN OF GOD**

**Xx~xx~xX**

**DANISHKA NEBARI**

**Xx~xx~xX**

This was awkward.

"... This is Charlie Swan" Cindy said smiling a little and then shuffling to her left and patting Bella lightly "And his daughter, they will be joining us for dinner"  
"Why?" I blurted rudely, frowning at Isabella's beaming happy face.

"Uhm..." she twisted her hands in each other, she pressed her lips together and then decided to ignore my question and led us all to the kitchen table instead "Well, this will have to serve as a dining table"  
"That's okay Cindy" Bella's dad murmured in a dry sort of voice, already taking a seat like _he had been here before._

"Bella, you can take a seat too" Cindy smiled at her and Bella did her nervous lip biting and blushing. I stood there, watching them like they were performing some sort of play for me in the kitchen.

"Danii?" Cindy murmured and I blinked dumbly at her. She had the chair pulled out for me, opposite Bella-all of them looking at me like _I was the mad one here._

"What in the name of all that is good...?" I began and then just shook my head, frowning at all of them "You are all mad. I will not participate in this madness goodnight."

And with that, I stomped upstairs leaving a spluttering Cindy calling me back.

Xx~xx~xX

I really don't know why I let Bella in when she knocked.

Somehow since I had woken up from my little blanket of misery, it was harder to be a brat about things. Just ignoring her timid knocks had crossed my mind, but then she started talking behind the door in a soliloquy like tone and she was never one for eloquence, it was turning into a verbal chainsaw massacre with each second I allowed it and in the end I had to take one for mankind...

"My dad hasn't been happier" she said-in a nutshell, after about seven minutes of talking.

"Cindy is twenty something, not even _late_ twenties" I stated. "Your Dad has a kid-_you_"

"She has you"  
"I am not her kid" I said dryly.

"But they like each other" Bella protested.

"Then they can like each other at _your_ house" I sighed, falling on my bed "Look, I am not going to get in the way of this weirdness or whatever, but I seriously don't want it in my face. I have been through a lot recently"  
"We could be best friends"  
"We are _barely_ friends" I said absently and she inhaled a shaky breath and let it escape in a pathetic sound that worked on my intolerance once more. "Okay, close acquaintances..."

"Why don't you come with me to the movies?" Bella asked "It's a whole bunch of us... you can get lost in the group"  
"No"

"It's not healthy to be alone when you are heartbroken"  
"Don't talk about things you don't know about" I growled and she shrunk away from me.

"Please?"  
"No"

"This has nothing to do with my Dad and your sister..." she explained and I cringed, she ignored it continuing with a little more conviction "I like you"  
"I don't... uhm, I am flattered but..."  
"Not in a romantic sense!" she blushed "Just, since I got here... you have been the one person who has been _real"_

"Gosh, I wish I had been more imaginary now" I said and she laughed.

"Will you come?"

"Just that once" I conceded wearily "And after that... no group anything. No formulating Lauren into my space"

"Lauren tends to formulate herself to any space" Bella sighed.

"She does, doesn't she"  
"Will you come down..."

"Not in a million years, your dad is ancient and a cop" I snapped and added lightly "I have been known to hang around some questionable characters"  
"I know" she whispered blushing and my insides constricted; of course, besides my being 'real' with her, I had also been close to a boy she had somehow made herself fall in love with. A boy-a young man-who had wrenched my heart from my chest and clouded my mind of what little I knew about love and acceptance.

Xx~xx~xX

It was going to be a disaster that was the only forecast I could give. Lauren would be most ruthless at my presence and I would be unable to hide the fact that I didn't want to be there...

I was the worst actress and this was the worst sort of script to ever be written. Hopeless teenage introvert amongst a group of boisterous teens... it was so played out...

"Hey"

Things got drastically worse.

"It's Jacob, right?" I smiled weakly at him, attempting not to swallow myself whole with embarrassment. Hadn't I blushed the last time we met... for this much younger boy...

"Like you forgot" he said cockily but it was that kind of arrogance that was impossible to be angered by; the mildly irritating kind that somehow managed to be endearing at the same time.

"Like I forgot" I said the words but without his slight cynicism, coating them in a sort of contemplation.

"Seems you and I stick out here" he sighed, gesturing at the laughing group in front of us; Bella was spreading herself thin as 'Movie Hostess'.

"Seems so" I breathed "Nothing new for me though..."  
"Yes, you do look like the suffer in silence type" he said raising a full eyebrow; we shuffled a step forward in the movie line together.

"Do I now?" I said, half listening to him and being lost in a painful memory.

"Yeah, you are definitely the 'misunderstood teenager'" he chuckled.

"And what, your parents understand you?" I asked him, snapping out of a world were I discussed how wrong the film industry had gotten vampire mythology with a real vampire.

"My dad... he lets me be me" Jacob sighed "When he isn't trying to let me be him"

"And your mum?"  
"She died" he stated. "Oh, look... it's our turn to get a bit of Bella"

"Guys!" Bella squealed "Uhm, what seats...?"

"Why don't we just give our tickets to the ticket guy, hmm Bells?" Jacob snickered, his eyes twinkling when he looked at her. She blushed, punching him lightly and stumbled into the dark cinema.

"So, still got a thing for Bella?" I whispered quickly to him and he paused abruptly in our dark trekking in the cinema and I collided with his back.

"Who said I had a thing to begin with" he hissed at me.

"Your eyes" I murmured "Very expressive globes, you have there Mr Jacob"

"You're absurd" he mumbled.

"You wouldn't be the first one to tell me that"

Xx~xx~xX

That's how it started and we became the strangest sort of trio. She would invite me to go with her to La Push-stating that Jacob enjoyed our little fights (for some unknown reason, Jacob and I were incapable on agreeing on anything, no matter how obvious the answer was).

I watched amused as Jacob's crush on Bella grew, and Bella's denial for his crush intensified in accordance to how obviously _unchildlike _Jacob was getting. He was about fifteen and looked nothing like it; tall, too muscled and with a certain maturity he carried to his day to day life. I only intercepted their little world during those many afternoons we did our homework together and bantered, but it was their world in the end. Jacob and Bella knew each other in a way that I could not ever hope to understand or become a part of. Their fathers knew each other, they had history and undoubtedly a future I had... I had my nights and other days alone, to ponder about _him _and where he was... if he had stored the memory of our time together somewhere far of and continued with his life as before.

Like I could ever forget him... how naïve he was or cruel to hope such a thing of me. Such a hopelessly cruel angel... and I didn't want to think if what he had said was true. That their being away would help me with the thirst. I didn't want to think about it as days stretched out before me and I had minor little throat sores, easily ignorable and I had accidentally smashed the glass tumbler in my hand after the loud bang of the window blowing shut had scared me. Minor incidents; nothing like killing ones cat and breaking the balustrade to a stairway...

It felt like an easier alternative to accept from the hell of wallowing in the memory of his face, voice and eyes.

"Danishka?" Cindy knocked on my bedroom door lightly "Bella is here for you..."

Xx~xx~xX

"...and he won't pick up my calls" Bella cried. "I told him I wanted to be friends!"

"Do you want to be friends?" I asked her and she frowned viciously at me, as though I was entirely retarded for asking that.

"No, he is what..." she looked away, leaning on her truck and scowling at the nearby forest like it too had accused her of being uncertain of her feelings "Fourteen"  
"Fifteen" I corrected, she knew of course and of course she had thought of reciprocating Jacob's affection outwards but no matter how much a martyr for the socially ostracized Bella wanted to be; she cared about her title as one of the popular girls at school. Whether she would admit it to me or herself, it was there.

"I am miserable" she sighed, gulping and wiping away a stray tear violently "This feels horrible"  
"Has uhm..." I tried to recall the odd names of Jacob's friends and then gave up, I had only met them once and Jacob and Bella spoke about them too much that I had tuned that particular chatter out.

"His friends?" I asked eventually and she sighed.

"Embry started hanging out with that gang..." Bella breathed "Quil... haven't seen him. Billy said Jake is sick with mono so..."  
"So maybe he really is sick" I sighed, my patience waning.

"Maybe, but he is avoiding me" she said in a defeated tone.

"I don't know what... I can do"

"No, it's okay..." Bella sighed, entering her truck. "I'll see you at school, Dan..."

"School" was all I managed to say, watching her drive out.

Xx~xx~xX

"He still hasn't called or returned your texts?" I asked her, worried beside myself.

I wasn't really used to having such connections with other people; worrying about them and such, but Jacob... Jacob was all about Bella. It would have been a great shift in nature for him to ignore her and be away from her for a good three weeks...

"No" she murmured miserably, shuffling besides me towards our cars. It was Friday, and Cindy and her Dad were going out to someplace that I had no intention of knowing of. This Jacob thing would soon turn into me babysitting her... Bella was alright, if Jacob's wit was there to buffer out her slight self-obsession...

"And the worst thing is..." she breathed shakily, gulping back tears "I saw him!"  
"So why didn't you just..." I began but she spun on her heels and pressed her lips together controlled before spewing what I could only imagine to be a good few hours of held back angst.

"He was across the hill... you know, the one where there is that dangerous turn" she said illustrating with her hand; waving it haphazardly in the air "Over the seas by that really high cliff!"

"Uh..."

"He was cliff diving with them!" She hissed. "Sam and them. And he said he didn't like them... he said he didn't like the gang and there he was, Danii!"

"Uhm"

"And I saw them twice, worst part...!" she continued "After Billy told me he was in bed sick!"  
"Okay, Bella maybe if..."  
"So you know what we are going to do?"

"No?" I breathed exasperated by her rant.

"We are going to go hiking to that cliff and confront him" she said impassioned, nodding her head. "Bye Danii"

"Bella?" I said dazed but she was already fussing with her seatbelt and closing the door.

We had a day to be without Cindy and Charlie and she wanted to spend it searching for Jacob in the woods. And she thought I would willingly sacrifice such freedom to be away form Cindy and her hints that if I didn't get out of my sullenness I would be going on a trip to Grandma.

"You just might be on your own there, Bells" I sighed, driving my shaking car to the library.

Xx~xx~xX

"Danishka"

"Alice... is that really you?" I whispered, peering through the shadows of my room. I moved quickly to the wall and flicked the light on. It was her, she was here... she stood before me pale and wonderful as she had always been.

"Alice" I breathed and she smiled sadly. "It is you, you are here..."  
"Danii" she said smiling sadly and reaching her dainty alabaster hand out to me. I moved lethargically towards her and brushed her cold fingers with my own. "You are alive!"

"Huh?"

"I thought I was too late" she said quickly, moving to the window and peering into the dark outside and frowning slightly. "I thought he had gotten to you?"  
"Who?" I asked softly standing beside her and squinting through the darkness. "Who Alice?"

"Laurent of course!" she hissed. "I tried to contact Edward but he..."  
"Edward, is he alright?" I asked hurriedly gripping her arm; she frowned at my hand on her arm.

"Ouch" she smiled "A little too strong for a human there, Nebari"

"Sorry" I released her arm and flexed my fingers, the blood rushing in my ears. My palms were sweating and I could feel every beat of my heart. Edward...

"He has gone into isolation" Alice said. "I saw the vision recently; I tried to contact him... well, I decided to take matters into my own hands"  
"I am fine" I said stonily. "Will you... will you leave... now that you know?"  
"Yes" she whispered, looking at me sadly "I have to, eventually... I came because I love you, you understand that?"

"I... fine"

"Danii, he loves you" she whispered.

"Right" I snorted "That's why he dumped me in the forest"

"Dumped...?"  
"You know how I meant it"  
"I know you love him too" Alice said and I remained silent. What did I know about love...?

"So Laurent would come for me" I said "Why him... he wanted no part in everything in the end"  
"I don't know" Alice said.

Xx~xx~xX

"She is safe" Alice breathed and the rest was said to fast for me to catch. She closed the phone with an easy twitch of her hand and looked sharply to her left. "I didn't see that..."

"See?" I asked her, staring at the closed blinds dumbfounded-my heart hadn't stilled since I had found her in my room.

"The Swan girl" she said turning her body fully towards the window before glancing at the door. "Someone is with her"

"How do you even..." I began but then just left it, moving towards the door and awaiting Isabella's knock impatiently. I could hear her fumbling steps and then stronger and yet more fluid footfalls resonated after her own.

The door knocked twice and I opened it quickly. She blinked at me, startled with her hand hovering in the air for a third knock and took a step back straight into Jacob's shirtless chest.

"Bella?" I said and my eyes slid from her perplexed face to Jacob's angry vicious glare. I instinctively moved behind the door, contemplating shutting it in both their faces for some unknown reason.

"There is a..."Jacob began and then shuddered, shaking his head hard before returning his acidic stare at me. "You have a guest with you"

"So" I said, quirking an eyebrow.

"It shouldn't be here..." he murmured low and Bella frowned back at him, a look of indignation on her face.

"Jacob... it?" she breathed. "Seriously?"

"You saw... you saw the..." he was shaking and shimmering. He shook his head again and closed his eyes tightly. "Bella, please leave... go back to your car. I need to talk to Danii and... The Cullen..."  
"Edward is back?" Bella asked loudly and pushed forward, shoving the door and me aside and hurrying in my house, ignoring Jacob's hand trying to reach for her. She walked in rudely, turning her head this way and that and when she saw Alice standing still and neutral in the middle of the kitchen she gasped softly.

"Alice Cullen?" she asked, her eyes wide. Something about her expression gazing at Alice was off, something was wrong...

"Bella" Alice's clear voice rang through dead quiet space. She ignored Jacob's ferocious look and looked at Bella contemplatively "Alive and well, I see..."

It all fell into place then; I was supposed to go with Bella hiking today. She wanted to make it to the cliff face she had seen Jacob and his new friends jump off and confront him or something. I had needed a distraction from life. Laurent... my dreams... he had been in the woods. Bella and I were supposed to be dead...

"No thanks to you!" Jacob growled and I snapped my head from Bella to him. He smelt like the forest, like something wild and untameable. "We... we..."  
"You took care of it?" Alice pieced the weird puzzle and I looked at her questioningly. "I trust our... agreement with your fathers still stands?"

"Of course" Jacob spat. "Bella, we should leave. Yes, let's leave... she wants to be here with it"

He meant me, I was the one who wanted to be here... with it? He knew, how could he know and how could he take care of 'it'... I was staring at Jacob in fear; fear of the information he held and sudden intense pain when he gave me one last disgusted reproachful look as he backed out of the house.

"He knows!" I breathed as Isabella's truck roared away from us.

"What does it matter?" Alice asked sadly "He wont tell"  
"He... what?" I stammered.

"He wont tell" Alice said. "Unless he wants us to uncover the fact that he is a werewolf"

"What the fuck!?" I yelled, fisting my hair.

"A werewolf... oh, Danii please..." she appeared in front of me and tugged my hands away form my hair easily "Your hair is already in such a state, lets not let theatrics turn it into an irrecoverable disaster?"

Xx~xx~xX

The night seemed endless, with Alice there with me... telling me all the things the Cullen's had been up to. Their many little meaningless immortal trivia's and adventured. Her Jasper, Carlisle and Esme and even Rose and Emmett.

He wasn't with them. He hadn't been with them in a while... but he had phoned and that was what mattered, she assured me. Could I be assured at this point?

"I have a ticket..." I told her, letting her conduct her meticulous manicure on my nails. "To South America... well, Cindy had gotten it as a threat but I guess I really should use it now"  
"Yes" Alice sighed, closing the red varnish "You really should get a change of scenery from all this rainy gloom and besides... the neighbourhood seems to have a new infestation of stray mangy dogs"

I looked up at her reproachfully and she smiled sheepishly. "He was a friend to me, you know" I told her seriously.

"Well, now he can be a pet..." Alice said matter-of-factly.

"Bella is a friend too" I whispered "And she... she likes him in her way. And they compete my little world here"  
"I understand" she whispered. "But werewolves are not good company"  
"And vampires are?" I challenged and she smiled a small sad smile.

"No, I guess we aren't... are we?"

"Not particularly..." I sighed, falling back on my bed and staring at the crimson colour coated on my nails. "I will see him again. I will. I am adamant about that"  
"You can't find him if he doesn't want to be found" she told me.

"He wants to be found... just by the right person" I whispered, closing my eyes and pulling on an image of him smiling at me.

"And you are certain you are the right person?" Alice asked.

"You and I both know I am" I told her a little a little haughtily and she laughed. "Will you be gone when I wake up?"  
"Yes" she murmured. "I will"  
"Hmm" I sighed, letting the edges of sleep consume me. "Me too. I will be gone... a change of scenery and a relationship to mend... I do miss my Grandmother"

Xx~xx~xX

"Baby!" she breathed and I felt my chest tighten in a weird juxtapose of pain and comfort. She rushed towards me in her wobbling gait, her smile pulled through on her etched worn face and her eyes dimmed and shaded in the deep encasing of the folds of her eyelids.

I was vaguely aware that I had a pained smile on my face as I watched my grandmother-my aunt in truth, but that was a long story that involved many lies and secrets and I had come here to heal our relationship.

Sometimes healing meant letting sleeping dogs lie. Sometimes healing meant never knowing about your past if it was held by the one person who would always be on your side. She would always be on my side, my grandmother.

She tried to take my bags for me and I repeated for her to let them be in shady Portuguese.

"Oh, baby" she sighed and it hurt me so badly to realise I had chosen Forks over her. I had chosen Edward over her... and there was no way I could make her understand how special he was outside of his archangel devastating handsomeness because as far as she was concerned, he was a monster.

A vampire.

But it didn't matter, just like the secrets she kept from me because time had moved and everything that had mattered had past. Edward had left; he had gone away from me and finally disappeared.

"I missed you" I whispered to Pangra and she grinned at me from her short height, revealing stained cream teeth. We moved slow and easily through the airport, she had already begun telling me of the town house she had acquired-promising me that this was a far cry from the village she had been originally staying in and I would adapt easily.

"We can go and visit the village though" she murmured, giving instructions to the cab driver in quick Portuguese in regular intervals "I have a few friends who are still moving on this earth who would like to see you"

"I would like that" I told her, staring out the window at the bright lights and liveliness of Rio de Janeiro.

"How long are you staying?" she asked me-this time that odd youthful energetic quality that had been working through her ancient body lost and a wariness fell over her eyes.

"Uhm..." I stammered, staring at my hands. The red nail polish still glinted over my nails and I was suddenly terrified without reason that Pangra would know that Alice Cullen-a vampire, a monster to her-was the one to apply the colour with calculated precision.

"You never come to South America" she said after I failed to answer "I was just... it's a short visit, right?"  
"Do you want it to be a short visit?" I asked her, looking at her with as much intensity as she was giving me. The driver had stopped in front of a slightly worn building with almost three floors to it.

"It has to be a short visit" she said looking away. "We are here"

"I see" was all I said, exiting the cab. I felt the hot air of this strange land on my neck, tickling my nape and alerting me that I had a sheen of sweat over the skin there. I was hot, the drastic change in weather and atmosphere made me feel queasy and lethargic-as though the heat here was draining my energy in comparison to the perpetual coolness of Forks.

I followed her up silently; she spoke rapidly in Portuguese now, mixing it with a few words of Spanish-oblivious or unperturbed that I wasn't following her as easily. Her home was quaint; small rooms lit in varying yellow and orange hues with a cool ceramic flooring.

"Do you wish to eat?" she asked me in English and I frowned suspiciously, she was switching languages to suit her.

"No, I wish to sleep" I said tetchily although my stomach growled and with it I felt the telltale signs of an itching throat-a soon to be _burning _throat.

"Your room is on the left" she told me softly and moved towards it.

As much as I needed to let these 'sleeping dogs' lie, they're presence between Pangra and I was grating on everything. The light went of but I lay wide awake, listening with a supernatural keenness to the surrounding sounds of life and movement around us. Every blink I made through the soft shadows of my room gave way to yellow eyes, honeyed eyes-looking upon me with an odd adoring humour from an ethereal face.

"I need to forget you, Edward" I murmured, Pangra's soft snore droning from down the narrow hallway.

"Please, let me forget you..." I mumbled, my eyes drooping before slamming shut-and nightmares of red eyed demons chased me through the night.

Xx~xx~xX

I woke up with pains in my joints. I didn't bother moving for a good few minutes, opting to lie in bed and nudge my limbs loose slowly.

"Danishka?" Pangra knocked softly on the door "I have started on your breakfast"  
"I will be out" I groaned and she sighed, shuffling away.

I got up slowly, swinging my legs over the bed. My heart was still thudding insistently, my vision popping oddly at the corners. She was right, I couldn't stay long. as much as I had needed the change of scenery from the coldness of Forks-from the memory of Edward and I's blossoming 'friendship' and the family that I had never had, the Cullen's-I had left something as precious to me than a vacation from my memories.

I had left Cindy. I had left my sister, for all intents and purposes. And I had left Laurent... and his red eyes. As dead as James could be thanks to Edward... Laurent was there and I had neglected that, I had chosen to let that be with fear of what confronting it would mean to me. Jacob and Bella-how could they fair against something hard and cold and destructive as a vindictive vampire...

"Breakfast looks..." I breathed staring at the assortment of fruits under strawberry yoghurt "Healthy?"  
"Hmm" Pangra smiled. "You need to be healthy, to live healthy... you start with what you eat"

I looked at her closely and she smiled the smallest knowing smile and I had to look away. Pangra and her implications, she was most good at those. You start with what you eat... I wonder what she would do if I told her I had killed my cat and quenched a rare and torturous thirst on its blood...

I wonder what she would do if I told her that her very heart beat was a distraction to me right now and I feared that in my tensed state, the lovely breakfast she had laid out would taste like dusty dry wood.

I picked the plastic spoon up experimentally, and she sat opposite me and pulled her own bowl to her.

"Mhmm" I smiled and she nodded in encouragement, taking a loaded spoon full of the fruit pieces and muesli in yoghurt. "Delicious"

"Yes, it is" Pangra greed "I am glad you are here"  
"I am glad to be here" I said.

"I left Forks under..." she paused, sighing a little and looking away from me "I left... I had to leave"

"I understand" I told her, prodding the breakfast lightly and frowning at its healthy humanly goodness. "It's in the past"  
"The past..." Pangra laughed lightly, derisively "Do you know how dangerous the past is?"  
"I... uhm, I don't know" I mumbled.

"You have to leave soon, my love... my dear, Danishka" she said, leaning over the table and holding her wrinkled hands up. They shook slightly. "I am glad you came, but no where is as safe as Texas"

"Texas?" I gasped, pushing away from the table so suddenly and with to much force it moved forward and trapped her in her seat "Hector? What are you saying to me?!"

"You and I know you cannot stay where those monsters are!" she growled, her eyes flashing dangerously "Do not court them... do not invite them... leave them be!"

"If it pleases you, Grandmother" I almost spat-my own anger rising in accordance with her violent vehemence, her badly hidden fear of these 'monsters' "They left"  
"They..." she tilted her head in confusion, derailed by my weak proclamation-suspicious of it "They left?"  
"They left" I said again and pulled the table away from her easily. She stared at me for a second-I wasn't sure if she wanted to see the truth on my face or if she could see the pain of the revelation in me. She looked at me closely, her eyes softening and her expression relaxing.

"It was for the best... it is for the best" she nodded "I thank God"  
"God has nothing to do with it" I snapped.

"How right you are" she smiled "They have nothing to do with God, such Dark Creations"

I remained quiet to that.

"The past is dangerous" she said softly, tired-almost as though something that had been shackling her since I had arrived had been released. She let her weariness show, fully exposed and it hit me how truly old she was. "Your past... is dangerous but none more so than your mother"

"My..." her word confused me even though a voice in the back of my mind murmured how they made fearsome sense "My _mother_?"  
"Your mother" she repeated, looking at me carefully "Her past... and I suppose her mother's fate before her have... have put your life, my Danishka... at risk. Your life has been endangered since your birth, since your conception even! And those demons leaving Forks has given you more time, more _life_... and I wont be around my baby to help you stay safe" she finished softly, waving a hand over her form " I am old"

"Pangra?" I said softly, my heart hammering in my chest. I was terrified of her words. I clutched the arm of the wooden chairs tightly and ignored the roaring in my ears, begging my senses to remain focused on her.

"Your mother... was exceptional" she began softly "In more ways than beauty and her compassion..."

Xx~xx~xX

Her name had been Talia and I had her eyes.

She met a man, she met a living breathing man and she loved him and he loved her. Their love was simple and pure and had no complications save for her beauty, her angelic beauty but that too was easily ignorable in the face of such an emotion. Pangra had not been nearly as young, and she had had a daughter then.

Talia had come to her in the little jungle she had grown up in; a village coddled by thick trees and wild terrain, a village hidden to the world. She had blown her away with her beauty but it was the fire in her eyes that had let her know of the goodness within my mother. It was those eyes and the cheek bones that had let Pangra know that what Talia said of her being her relative, her sister-was entirely true.

"She was most beautiful" Pangra sighs "And I loved her. You see, my mother had died in the woods. Village men had found her body ripped by animals... she had been missing prior to that for some time. So when she came to me, when I had thought I was alone and truly damned..."  
"Damned?" I asked her softly and she chuckled softly.

"Yes, my dear... damned" she said dryly "With no mother and a father lured away by the wealth and whores of Rio, I was left with nothing save for this body. And they took it. The men... they took it because it had no one to protect it or insure it. I was much a woman when I had my baby, I was also nearing starvation and death when Talia came to me"

"She came..." Pangra said wistfully "And rescued us. She helped us build a home on the outskirts, she helped care for my baby and teach her the English... and I was happy. Finally"

"And then what happened?" I asked her softly and she snorted, shaking her head.

"Then she fell in love" she said "To a man, this angel. He didn't deserve her, by God he didn't and I never let him forget it!"

"What was his name?" I asked her.

"Henry" she said indifferently "You get your skin from him"  
"You didn't like him because he had dark skin?" I laughed and she pursed her lips.

"No, I didn't like him because he was 'simple'" she snapped, tapping the side of her head indicatively. "But he loved her, adored and her and worshipped her"

"They were happy" I said to myself, smiling a little. "Happy"  
"Yes, until she became pregnant" Pangra murmured "And then it was obvious that Talia was not so much an angel as we thought"

Xx~xx~xX

It started with strange deaths of the livestock. Cows were found fat and whole but with only a strange ripping wound on their necks and drained of blood. The villagers were terrified, talks of demons and angered ancestors gave fuel to an inferno of suspicion and paranoia.

Amidst all of this, Talia became distant.

"She was easily angered" Pangra continued "She was skittish. She had always been most alert, most nimble but it intensified. She didn't pretend so much about her beauty and her fluid nature that Henry and I had always suspected of but remained silent to. She was our angel, she could appear suddenly before us and lift trees so easily... but she always did these things in moderation"

"But then..." she sighed "She did not hide it. She would remain in her hut, curtains drawn and refused to eat. She demanded to know of anything strange in the village or of any news of the distant surrounding villages..."  
"She terrified me" Pangra admitted unwillingly "My angel, my sister... she terrified me. At times she would look at me with such intensity I thought she may swallow me whole!"  
I shuddered, remembering Edward's explanation of the distinct concentration of a vampire's thirst.

"And then she started to 'speak'" Pangra breathed "She spoke of impossible things; a father who was a demon, how she knew who killed our mother-saying it had been her, in her birthing!"  
"She told me of a sister of hers who had the ability to persuade beings to do her bidding, she told me of another sister who could pull out certain memories from a beings mind for good" Pangra said quickly "She told me of a brother she had found who lived with his Aunt, and that these two beings are what had persuaded her to seek me out"  
"And you didn't believe her?" I guessed "Even though she gave proof to some of this; with strength so vast and speed..."

"Even though she did all these things" Pangra admitted "I thought she was a deranged angel. Understand, some Christian missionaries had made contact with our village and we were all very taken with them"

"So when did you believe?" I asked her.

"Not when you were born so perfect and human, no not then" Pangra said. "You were born and we loved you. She loved you... but Talia, she was living on edge. She was terrified of the wind and the rain... of everything. Terrified of this demon father, who she was convinced was searching for her..."

"And after three years or so..." Pangra murmured "She had a visitor. A sister, the one she told me could steal memories forever. You were talking by then, eloquently and with startling intelligence..."

She was quiet for a little while, and then she took in a breath and let it out steadily before holding my gaze.

"Time had moved, before you had been born... Danishka" she said seriously. "Henry and I, we were old enough but Talia... how beautiful she had remained. My child had gone to America with the English I never knew of and she had been scheduled to visit me at the time this one _sister _came to the village"  
"It had been the one she spoke of, the one who stole memories forever" Pangra scowled "She came and warned Talia that her father and another one of her sisters had tracked her... that they were coming and they were not pleased with what she had done"

"Talia revealed to me her true form then" Pangra continued airily "That I had it confused; she was no angel but a demon. And she proceeded to scare them and torment half the village into leaving. And you and my child-you were my children! She had arrived, I couldn't leave you... you wouldn't leave her, you wouldn't leave Henry and then he did arrive"  
"He saw you" she said "And he said..."

"Dim and Bland human" I murmured "Uninteresting and Unworthy..."  
"And he killed him" she went on "And then Talia distracted him enough... and the sister..."  
"The one who stole memories" I guessed and Pangra nodded.

"Yes, she rescued us" Pangra stated "He decided you were..."

"Not worth it" I murmured "Human"

"No, no..." Pangra breathed "He was confused momentarily; having forgotten why he was so incensed. But later on, the woman... she told me she hadn't managed to steal the memory of his initial target from his mind. A vampire's mind, she had explained-required more than just staring into the eyes. Like with simple humans..."  
"Her eyes" I murmured, thinking on the flat brown eyes that I sometimes dreamed of, the eyes that morphed into red.

"She cleared your mind" Pangra finished "But it was done. Talia was dead and with her, many humans-Henry and my daughter included. So we were left with no other alternate than to run... far and wide... and away. Until I convinced Hector to take you in"  
"Until you lied to him" I said.

"Was it so much a lie?" she asked softly but I ignored her, my insides swirling violently. "You see why they are dangerous? They are all demons..."  
"I dome from then" I told her.

"No, you come from Talia!" she growled. "You stay away from them and you need to stay away from here... I am old; I am nearing the end of my days..."

"I won't leave you!" I said frowning, but Cindy's happy face flashed over my vision with Jacob Black's violent expression looming over it. I was torn; she was right, she was old and I wanted to be here with her until the end but Cindy had nothing but Bella's idiot father to protect her from shadows and demons...

"An old friend of mine contacted me from my village" she said softly, her hands shaking slightly and eyes wide "We had lost contact long ago; she had fallen on hard times... What an interesting tale she had"

"What tale?" I asked Pangra.

"She met a young man by the name of Anthony" Pangra murmured and I froze, my hands fisting over the table. She was this and she blanched. "He convinced her to show her the village she is from. She took him, and they met two other beings-South American's, but they were as beautiful as this man... this Anthony"

"Edward Anthony..." I murmured softly and she watched me keenly.

"And this man... this beautiful _white _and _pale as death _man..." Pangra said with venom "He let them leave. He left them by their village... alive"

"In South America?" I asked loudly "Here in South America... in your village, past Peru...?"  
"He was with two others who were like him... in South America... a man and a woman" Pangra growled. "Her father and her sister, I am sure... he was with them and he told them about you"  
"He would never..." I hissed and she raised a worn grey eyebrow.

"Wouldn't he, now?" she asked "They appear angels, my love... but they are demons"  
"No" I shook my head.

"And remember..." Pangra murmured "She has a gift to persuade..."  
"Not Edward!" I breathed.

"Don't let Talia and Henry have died in vain" she said and I looked away from her, hiding my shaking hands in my lap "In the end, it is those that breathe and bleed that are the children of God, Danishka"

**Xx~xx~xX**

**X**

**Xx~xx~xX**

**AUTHORS NOTE:**

**Firstly, I thank you for reading this! Please, pretty please... review your thoughts on things. I would be forever grateful! I know oc pairings can be tiring but please stick around! As usual, thoughts criticism is greatly appreciated**

**Xx**

**TJ**


	3. Searching

"A friendly visit... dear son?" he says, his red eyes dancing with an unquenchable sort of curiosity. A dangerous inquisitiveness. Nahuel looks quickly to Huilen, a move too fast for any human to take notice of... but there are no humans in the dark shadows of the edge of their territory. There is no life here, save for the crawling creatures and Nahuel's single fleeting heart beat.

"It is good to see you, Flora" he replies instead, nodding to his beautiful scowling sister standing tense and defensive at Joham's side. She frowns further-acknowledging him-and returns her gaze to nothing.

"Ah, Huilen!" Joham breathes with excitement, overruling Nahuel's chariness and taking several quick steps forward in seconds. She growls at him, her body automatically coiling and he stops his movement, throwing away his dangerous pleasantries and sneering at them both.

"Well, then..." Joham breathes, his sharp features pulled rigidly on his glorious demon face "I see you have not missed me as I missed you?"  
"What is it you want?" Huilen growled.

"Information" Joham states coolly, stalking their thin personal bubble contemplatively, his boots crushing the dry undergrowth deliberately "About the vampire two women in your _stock-village _claim to have seen"

She tensed then but controlled herself-stopped herself from glancing at Nahuel-but his heart beat had picked up so easily. That treacherous living thing in his chest that she had been jealous of on numerous occasions would cost them now...

"We know not of what-" she began steadily but Joham hissed, his eyes flashing dangerously.

"You think I would leave that accursed place without placing my own insurance?" he asked softly but his voice dripped with venom-he took another step forward, Flora shadowing the movement a few feet to his left, flanking her father.

"You think I am an idiot?" he asked in deadly indignation, his full eyebrow quirking upward-his eyes remained rooted to Huilen's face. She shook her head tersely and glanced at Nahuel finally. Her nephew remained staring at Flora-staring at her smiling twisted expression.

"Don't look at her..." she whispered to him but he only blinked hard and took a forced step towards his hypnotising sister.

"These women told a source of mine..." Joham breathed-speaking to her only, deliberately oblivious to Nahuel's soft shudders in the peripheral of his vision-trying to shake of Flora's compelling.

"They spoke not only of a white vampire that asked to be led to _your _village, Huilen" he snarled, lips twisting sardonically "But of two other demons; one with red eyes and another beautiful and young male. Both who were so obviously _South American..._?"  
"We know not..." she began her feeble explanation and he tutted apologetically "Human's come up wit tales of supernatural all the time, Joham" she tried again but one last glance to Nahuel told her her lie would soon be refuted. He stood infront of Flora-she had her hands in his hair, undoing his braid as though he was a doll-shuddering and twitching. Compelled.

It was easier for her to use her gift on Nahuel, Huilen knew this. Easier on beings with hears and blood and ever fluctuating emotions...

"Flora, ask your brother about the friend he made..." Joham instructed sweetly to his deranged daughter.

"Brother" Flora spoke in a clear ringing voice "What friend have you made that would have you lie to us?"  
"Edward" Nahuel said shaking-fighting against t eh nauseating effects of her persuading. He shut his mouth with a clinking of his teeth as his jaws clamped.

"What did he want!?" Joham demanded, flashing over to Flora's side "What was he seeking in my territory?"  
"Your territory?" Huilen growled and Joham scoffed, waving a hand in her direction insolently.

"If it were not for me you would not be a Goddess right now, simple _woman_!" Joham sneered "Show thanks to your Creator!"  
"It was for Nahuel..." she began and he laughed at her.

"And who is Nahuel's father?" he asked tilting his head "Who made a demigod of him, hmm?"  
"Father?" Flora whispered "Hurry, he will fling it off soon..."  
"What did the vampire want?" Joham asked quietly, his red eyes boring into Nahuel's brown vacant ones.

"He..." Nahuel shuddered, his eyes trying to pull away from Flora's but swinging back to their titanium hold with each slight swivel "He wanted me... he was searching for me"

"You?" Joham asked and Huilen tilted her head to her nephew in confusion.

"Answers" Nahuel coughed out "About... Talia"

Joham froze then, his eyes bulging slightly and breathing stopped. Suddenly he felt like the quiet dimness held forms that his predatory God form could never manage to scare off. He looked to his left quickly and then snapped his head right before taking a calculated step towards Nahuel-Huilen appearing behind her nephew instantly and growling at him in warning.

"Did he wear...?" Joham asked softly, ignoring the violence rolling over the small vampire "A cloak with..." he pointed on his chest with a long index finger "A symbol?"

"He wore a shirt and pants..." Nahuel murmured "With a horse ...as a symbol"

"Polo!" snorted Flora and Joham shushed her impatiently.

"Not them..." Joham murmured, watching as Huilen locked Nahuel protectively in her arms-she was wise enough to allow Joham to get what he wanted, the sooner he got it the sooner he would leave them.

"How did he know of Talia?" Joham demanded.

"He didn't say" Huilen answered quickly but Nahuel continued to stare at his sister's almost black eyes, his lips quirking in anticipation to the words being persuaded out of him.

"He was looking for something else" Nahuel said over Huilen's soft moans and begging for him not to talk "Something about the child..."

"The child died..." Joham interrupted him, smiling at Huilen, watching her closely.

"She..."  
"Nahuel no!" Huilen whispered desperately but he only shuddered in her arms before throwing everything into the flames.

"She lives" he revealed, blinking rapidly "In America..."

"She is human" Joham said stonily "She matters not. Talia got her way, she always made sure of that... the child matters not except as a symbol of my daughters insolence. Release him Flora"

He stumbled back, Huilen holding him up easily and steadying him.

"You will..." Nahuel gasped "Leave her?"

"Now why would I do that?" Joham snapped, walking away from him, indicating Flora follow him "She may be human, but she carries the gene of the Gods..."

Xx~xx~xX

X

Xx~xx~xX

"We have to find him" he told her but she only shook her head, remaining still and unmoving in the heights of the tree, her red eyes swimming with fresh blood. "Huilen... we have to!"  
"He is probably in America by now, to his coven" she said eventually, staring down below at the broken body of the human girl. "Leave it be, this has nothing to do with..."  
"Talia went to great lengths to keep her child safe" Nahuel said.

"And she is dead for all her 'great lengths'" Huilen scowled and Nahuel hissed at her softly. "I do not mean to tarnish her memory, but your father... he believes he is a God. You know this"  
"So why tell me?" Nahuel demanded irritably, swinging easily from one branch to the next before perching fluidly below Huilen's seat.

"So you remember that he is dangerous" she whispered into the air, closing her eyes and pulling on the image of her long gone sister "You remember that in Talia it was history repeating itself except that child didn't turn it's Aunt into a vampire"  
He recoiled as though she had struck him, she might as well have with the contents of her words and the throbbing of his forever atoning heart. "She is a human child... you heard Edward" he said instead, ignoring the tenseness of the air and his own guilt.

"How can you be so sure?" she asked him and he gulped, his eyes darting through the thick canopy for the answer.

"The girls have no venom" he said quickly-desperately.

"Nahuel, we are family" Huilen warned "Do not go and look for more, your sisters are tainted by Joham..."

"The girls have no venom..." he continued his theory, ignoring her rolling eyes "So her child would have no poisoning..."  
"Theories...?" Huilen snorted elegantly. "You might as well become a scientist like..."  
"Do not compare me to Joham!" Nahuel growled, swinging his body up easily to crouch in front of Huilen on the top branch, glaring at her. She looked into his eyes patiently-wishing hers could be brown as the earth as his were, wishing her skin did not have an olive quality...

"You are my family and I am your family" she said calmly, her soft voice mingling with his deep breathing "Leave these catastrophes alone. Stop trying to be a human... stop it, now Nahuel!"  
"I am not..." he began and then grimaced looking away from her. "I cannot help it, I wonder... it is like you said; I am the reason you feed on humans. I am the reason you are a monster and I am the reason your sister is dead"  
"No..." she touched his hand briefly but he did not look at her, feeling the stinging in his eyes and willing it away "Joham is the reason; he is the devil in all of this"  
"And we are his demons, then" he breathed, finally looking at her-his eyes shining with liquid that wouldn't fall "And how evil we would be to let this girl be harmed"

"It isn't our place..." she protested and he shook his head.

"All we have to do is find Edward, Huilen" he told her seriously "We do not need to interrupt Joham..."  
"But we would be if we sought him out and warned him!" she yelled. "And what do you think he will do, hmm? Against Flora?"

"Did you see the light in his eyes when he spoke of her?" Nahuel asked smiling sadly "He would do anything... anything... just like Talia had been"

"You are jealous of such weak emotions" Huilen scoffed "Throw them away, dear Nephew... these petty jealousies for feeble things. They will lead you into death!"

"Or life..." Nahuel murmured "They lead Talia into life, did they not?"

"And she found life, and created it..." Huilen said "Just like my sister, your mother... and it lead her right back to death"

"It is you who explained to me the nature of the world" Nahuel laughed bitterly "We are all living on borrowed..."  
"You and I have no need to worry about being indebted to Life" Huilen snapped. "Now, why go out on credit against your father? Those sisters of yours would kill us for him, you know it! And that Flora..."  
Nahuel shuddered again, in revulsion beside himself.

"Yes, such a demented thing" Huilen murmured. "She thinks of you not as brother"

He remained silent to her words, not wishing to remember Joham's implications long ago about his sister and him in relation to his 'science'.

"I will help you" Huilen cut his brooding. "We will find him, quickly... before he reaches this strange coven of his"

"Thank you"

Xx~xx~xX

X

Xx~xx~xX

"I can't see...!" she yelled, waltzing away from them and standing despairing in front of the wall-in front of the giant painting of the Cullen Coven and Denali Coven together. She scowled at the figure of the bronze haired boy at the edge of the huddled group of beautiful pale beings.

"What do you mean..." Rosalie tried again and Alice hissed at her.

"I mean I can't see!" she growled "I can see nothing of consequence and I have no actual manual on it..."

"But Edward..." Esme tried and Alice groaned, cutting her.

"You make me feel like I have to bear it all!" Alice cried "I have no control on what I can see when it comes to Danishka and with Edward... he has made no active decisions. He is somewhere dark and cool-a cave. That is all I can tell and then just suddenly, his future disappeared from my radar; when I try and pull on it, it comes out unclear. Not black just..._a concrete wall_"

"Oh" Esme sighed, looking to Carlisle. He stood still with Eleazar, his face grave and eyes anxious.

"As long as Danishka is safe" Carlisle murmured.

"She went to visit her grandmother" Alice said softly "IN South America"

"Edward was in South America last" Rosalie stated.

"Well, that was what I was looking for..." Alice said coolly "And I can't see it. I can't see if he will find her or if she will find him. And like I said, he doesn't seem to be making any decision to leave whatever cave he has hidden himself in"

"There is no way she will find him if he doesn't want to be found" Emmett sighed

"If he is even in South America" Tanya pointed out "He could be in any cave..."

"Why leave there if not to come to us or go to her?" Jasper said "He has to be there somewhere; what better place than a continent with uncharted hidden nooks to disappear into?"  
"As long as she is away from Forks-and away from Laurent" Alice sighed "She is safe"

"We could go look for him?" Esme tried, tugging on Carlisle's hand "We could bring him back!"

"My love..." he sighed, holding her gaze "It wouldn't be so much 'bringing back' as it would be 'forcing back'. And you and I know better than anyone that when Edward wants to be alone... only he can decide to return to company"

Xx~xx~xX

X

Xx~xx~xX

"You said I could go and see..." I began and she shushed me, chopping the carrots with new found vigour and noise.

"No, no... I hadn't thought the statement through" she said quickly. I spluttered angrily, the Portuguese lost in my throat momentarily.

"I want to see, Nana" I whispered "I want to see where my mother had me; where we were happy"  
"No" she said. "Firstly-these demons where seen there and that white yellow eyed monster told them of you!"  
"Nana..."  
"You want to go find him" she whispered "I wont let you..."

"Hmm" I looked away form her anxious eyes.

"Please, Danishka, understand!" she implored but I remained silent "You have to stay away from them; you have to stay safe my child. You will return to America tomorrow morning, eh? You have to convince your sister to leave Forks..."  
"Why would I..."  
"Please, my child!" she begged and I resumes my controlled silence. "You have to look after each other, you know I wont be here long..."

"I know..." I moved around the counter to her and hugged tightly "I know, Nana... and I promise you; I will take care of Cindy"

"Good" she whispered, pulling away from me and wiping a stray tear before touching my cheek "That's all I needed to hear"  
And I knew it; that was all she needed to hear. But it didn't make it any less of the truth; I would care for Cindy because she was my sister, my cheerleader. But I had to take care of this one thing too... she wouldn't understand because she was blinded by her understanding of vampires born out of witnessing the cruelty of Talia's father. I had to go to the village, I had to go to the place were my mother had last been alive.

I had never really been superstitious and after meeting him-meeting Edward-I had thrown it all away. Of course I was afraid of her revelation that this true demon-this red eyed man with the leering seductive smile from my fuzzy memories; I was afraid he was loitering in the woods waiting for me.

That fear did not manage to trump the hope I had that Edward was there. That fear did not erase my desperate curiosity on Talia. I could go tomorrow morning, I could go quietly and if it took weeks... then so be it.

If you had a chance to piece together the fragmented crystal pieces of your life... wouldn't you? if you had a chance to pick up the shards of your heart and glue them back together... wouldn't you?

I know I would. I know I will.

I must.


End file.
